The Saratov Approach

So my husband picked out the movie this night. He mostly likes movies that "Are real". This movie is based on a true situation that did occur with some Mormon Missionaries. So guess what? It's going to be about 1) Mormons 2) Religious faith 3) Religious faith during times of intense trouble. Most people cannot deal with this subject matter in a mature or objective way anymore, preferring instead to be titillated by the glut of porn, violence, horror, and Computer Animated silliness.

I found this film a refreshing break from the endless morass of film mediocrity. An interesting story told without gratuitous sex, endless F-Bombs, or piles of oozing intestines falling out on the floor - imagine that?

A noticeably low-budget B-movie that is challenging your suspension of disbelief.

It was probably filmed in Ukraine (since it's cheaper, I guess) and all the billboards and labels in "Saratov" are actually not in Russian, which is extremely annoying. (Imagine a movie showing New York, where everything is written in German. The "Russian" guy in one of the scenes can't even pronounce the word "christian" properly). When the characters enter a typical panel-block house in "Saratov", we end up seeing your typical Brooklyn lobby. This series of flukes never ends.

The plot itself is predictable and spread out. The first 20 minutes of the film could easily be conveyed in 2 minutes. The rest of the movie maintains this ratio.

I am a religious person, and also a Mormon (or, a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints). I really liked this movie. Many of the reviews here are from people who obviously have an ax to grind against mormonism. If you don't like the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, then don't watch this movie! But, if you are an open minded Christian (or any religious person, for that matter) who would like to see an inspiring movie that is based on a true story, this movie is for you. Yes the film is a little preachy, so if that bothers you then steer clear.

The movie is a little slow at parts, but there is plenty of suspense. The main actors do a superb job, especially the Russians.

I like the direction that LDS cinema is starting to take. I heard about this movie from my uncle, who had just finished his mission in Russia when this story was happening, so he had some close personal connection to it. And the film turned out about like I expected it to, which is not a bad thing.

The first thing audiences will notice is the excessive use of hand-held camera, Bourne-style but in the wrong genre of film. Hand-held was a good choice generally, but every single shot was bobbing and moving around, often so much that it pulled me out of the story and reminded me that there's a camera in the room, a camera that won't sit still.

The next thing I noticed was that the camera assistants were not that good--focus was noticeably soft on a bunch of the shots, and many of the rack focuses were either too fast or too slow. I have worked on plenty of student productions that did much better than that.

The screenplay was pretty decent, actually. I am a screenwriter, so this is the area I pick on most closely, and they did all right. I felt like they relied too much on tears and violins to create emotional tension, but that happens in every single LDS film so I won't complain about that. I would have done some things differently, like not shown the ex-missionary who calls the parents, or given the parents something to do other than mill around the house looking concerned and/or crying. But the story moves forward in a way that builds tension and sets the stakes high, but allows room for some powerful moments.

On the whole, I would set this movie on the shelf right next to Saints and Soldiers. LDS cinema in general hasn't gotten to the point where it can really compete with Hollywood, but as far as LDS cinema goes The Saratov Approach is a pretty solid addition.

I first want to dispel a prevalent myth about this film, and all other publicly released films that portray members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and its members (except "Meet the Mormons"): This film was produced by a privately-owned production company that is owned by a member of the Church. It was not produced or endorsed by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. If it was, it would have had a MUCH bigger budget!

That being said, there are only two types of reviews on this film - very positive or very negative. Two or three people took the middle ground, but that's it. I enjoyed this film quite a bit, and found it to be very well-made with the limited resources the production company could afford, and I was impressed that a Mormon-cinema film actually went as far away as Kyiv, Ukraine to photograph the outdoor shots.

People who watched the film without any prejudice (Mormons and non- Mormons alike) saw a film about hope and forgiveness, and were inspired by it.

Those that hate the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints hate the film (shocking!) and saw it just so they could criticize any little pointless detail that they could find. In spite of the variety of their criticism, all of the negative reviewers have one thing in common as far as I can tell - they have never produced a film. They are also the ones that will find this review as not useful.

Some reviewers of this film called the plot predictable. Well, considering it's a true story and it was all over international news, it does't take a lot of effort to predict what was going to happen, does it? Maybe the filmmakers could have altered history, and changed the way things really turned out like in "Inglorious Basterds".

Other reviewers made the point that the story could have been told in ten minutes. Sometimes a filmmaker likes to give an audience a sense of how time drags in certain desperate situations, like in "Das Boot".

Some complaints are that the film is "preachy" or "too religious". Newsflash: It's about two men serving as missionaries for a church, and it's therefore their job to preach! Missionaries do that. On another Web site, some unnamed idiot from IMDb even criticized the Mormon filmmakers for making a film about Mormons, for Mormons, with Mormons in the cast, produced in a city with a 40% Mormon population. Maybe this person would have preferred that a Mormon make a film about Catholics, or Jews, or some other group that he doesn't know anything about.

A lot has been said about the actors being a decade or so older than the characters they portray. Personally, I'm getting tired of seeing Corbin Allred in every Mormon-cinema film that's released, but the fact is no production company outside of Utah is going to produce a film that gives a fair and accurate portrayal of Latter-day Saints, or the Church to which they belong. This film was produced by a company that's based in the Salt Lake City area, which believe it or not, is not a hotbed of acting talent, nor an entertainment Mecca. The guys that are cast in the film did an excellent job, and that's probably why they passed the audition. Get over it.

And finally, many bring up the fact that the film appears as if it was filmed on a low budget. Surprise! It was! In fact, one genius who's not in the United States decided that the apartment hallway looked like it was in Brooklyn, New York, USA. Actually, that scene, like all of the indoor scenes, was filmed in Draper, Utah.

The bottom line is, everyone that's curious about the film should see it. Those who are looking to find issues with it, will find issues, as with anything. Those who are looking for a story that is 95% accurate (according to the people that it's about) and a good example of an independent film, will be glad they saw it.